


Reflect/Refract

by AliceInKinkland



Category: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Genre: Angst and Porn, Character Study, Episode: s02e23 Crossover, F/F, Mirror Universe, Missing Scene, Moral Ambiguity
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-30
Updated: 2020-09-30
Packaged: 2021-03-07 23:27:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,722
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26735884
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AliceInKinkland/pseuds/AliceInKinkland
Summary: Through gritted teeth, Kira says, “Do your worst.”The Intendant laughs. “Myworst? Oh, Nerys. What are you so afraid of?”
Relationships: Kira Nerys/Mirror Kira Nerys
Comments: 2
Kudos: 37





	Reflect/Refract

**Author's Note:**

> Beta'd by my amazing partner, who is not on Ao3 but still deserves the shoutout. Watching DS9 with you is the best way to be spending 2020 <3

When Kira Nerys was fourteen, she spent a month in the foothills of the Dahkur Mountains, accompanying several other members of the Shakaar resistance cell on a mission to sabotage a new Cardassian mining operation. The youngest member of the party by four years, Kira had argued and cajoled her way onto the crew, a fact she did her best to remind herself of as she lay shivering and miserable under a thin blanket each night, the last lacerations of winter clawing their way into her bones.

She was in charge of fetching water every morning. She rose with the sun, grabbed the team’s four patched-up jugs and some carefully-rationed purification tablets, and went seeking the nearest water source. She liked this task: the ritual of it, the physicality, the chance to be alone in nature the way she so rarely had been while growing up in Singha Camp. And most of all, she liked the power of knowing she could keep herself and her comrades alive in this one small way.

One morning, she set off as usual, and walked until she found a stream, overflowing with spring runoff. There was a pool to one side of the flowing water, placid as the stream was violent, and as she prepared to fill the jugs, she happened to look into its calm surface and catch the eye of her reflection.

The face staring back at her made her gasp and drop one of the jugs into the stream. It bobbed for a moment as if hesitating, and then rushed away with the current.

Kira imagined returning to base camp with only three jugs. She imagined the stares, the whispers about how she must be too young to be trusted with real resistance work. She couldn’t let that happen. She couldn’t lose that jug.

Kira waded into the water, leaning into the current to keep from being swept away. The jug was caught between two rocks in the centre of the stream. Water rushed past, rocking the jug to and fro. It was only a matter of time before it would be dislodged, and then it would be gone for good.

Kira waded deeper. The rock bed was slippery beneath her, but she managed to stay planted on her feet as she reached out and grasped the jug. Shivering, she scrambled back to the bank, handle clutched tightly in her fist.

Soaked through, Kira returned to where the other jugs were, set down beside that smooth-surfaced pool.

She was cold, and tired, and no doubt already running late. But Kira knew what to do with things that frighten you: look them in the eye until they lose their power. She had to see. She had to look again.

So she stared at her reflection, studying its features: loose braid, proudly-ridged nose, the sparkle of her earring in the morning sun. She searched for what had disturbed her. Was she thinner than before? No, her face was slim and angular, hungry, but no more so than usual. Did she look older? Perhaps a little, but less than she would have expected, on the cusp of adolescence as she was.

Finding no answers, she simply stared at herself until she could not remember why she had been afraid.

It was a cold walk back to basecamp in her wet clothes, and when the other members of the team asked her what had happened, she did not know what to say. She had already killed many Cardassians since joining the Resistance, and each time she felt more of her fear dissipate: fear of the act itself, fear of Cardassia, fear of loss, fear of pain. And yet there she had been, this bright, beautiful morning, afraid of her own reflection.

* * *

“What do you think about purple?” The other Nerys—the Intendant—guides Kira by the hand into the adjacent room, shutting the door in the face of her Vulcan entourage. She is still wearing the robe from her bath, and though it falls half-open as she walks she makes no move to adjust it.

Kira reminds herself of her goal: play nice with this other self until she can find a way to get herself and Bashir back to their own world. But it would be a lot easier to play nice if she knew what the other Nerys wanted, or, for that matter, what she was even talking about. “Sorry, what?”

“Purple! For the party. We look so good in purple, don’t you think?”

“I haven’t really given it much thought.”

The other Nerys does not seem to hear her. She rifles through a massive closet, fingers dancing down a line of clothes as though she is playing a Cardassian harp. “Ah!” she says, fingering something disturbingly sheer. “Maybe? No, wait. Yes, this is the one.” She pulls out a flowing lavender jumpsuit and tosses it at Kira. “Try this on.”

“Where?” says Kira, looking around for wherever she is supposed to change. The fabric is softer than she would have expected from looking at the garment, and she can’t help rubbing it between her fingers.

“Well—right here,” says the Intendant, rolling her eyes. “Really, Nerys, it’s nothing I haven’t seen before. If it’ll make you feel better, I’ll go first,” and just like that, she undoes her robe and shrugs out of it with a flourish, letting the fabric pool at her feet.

Kira is not ashamed of her body. She is not even particularly private about it—years in refugee camps and crowded safehouses have made her think of getting dressed in private as more of a luxury than a necessity. But clothing is also armour. Her double knows this. She must be playing a game with her.

And Kira knows what her next move has to be.

She undoes the jacket of her uniform and tosses it aside. She is tempted to leave her undershirt on, but this might show fear, so she pulls it off as well, leaving her chest bare. Before she can think better of it, she undoes her boots, steps out of them, and pulls off her pants, leaving herself standing in nothing but a thin pair of briefs.

The Intendant eyes Kira’s body with more curiosity than Kira thinks is strictly necessary, considering that they are virtually identical. She feels exposed. It’s ridiculous. She reaches for the bundle of purple fabric her double threw her way, holding it up to see how to put it on.

“You’re in such a hurry, Nerys. Why the rush?”

“You told me to try this on, so I’m trying it on.” Kira should not be letting herself get annoyed like this. _Play nice, Nerys_. But the Intendant isn’t making it easy.

“‘You told me’...you make it sound like an order! Really, my dear, I keep telling you, I just want to get to know you!”

“And I need to be naked for you to get to know me?” As soon as Kira says it, and sees the Intendant’s resulting grin, she wishes she’d phrased that a little differently.

“Well...that is one way for us to get to know each other.”

Kira just stares at her, hoping her unimpressed expression will cover the racing of her heartbeat and the rush of blood between her legs. When did her arousal start? Has her double noticed?

The other Nerys lays down on the bed. It is circular, huge, big enough to fit many bodies, and Kira has no doubt that it has. The other Nerys props herself up with one elbow and actually licks her lips.

“It’s so warm in here, there’s no point to clothing anyway. Sharing a station with Cardassians is just one long battle with the temperature controls. Garak and I—no matter. It’s one of our little feuds, that’s all.” She smiles. “It will be so nice to have someone here who truly understands me.”

Kira remembers this kind of heat from when the station on her world was still under Cardassian control. She feels sick, suddenly, thinking of how much hotter it surely is in Ore Processing, where Bashir is stuck, sweating in that filthy darkness, counting on her.

“You look so tense, my Nerys! Let me help you relax.”

The invitation is unmistakable. Kira’s body feels alive with it. She shakes her head. “That’s really not necessary.”

“Don’t be silly! How about a massage? Don’t tell me you’re afraid of a massage.”

“Let’s not play this game.”

“Alright. What game would you rather play?”

“What do you want, Intendant?”

“Call me Nerys. It’s what I’m calling you.”

“What do you want, Nerys?”

Her double pouts. “I already told you! Love. A friend. Someone who will understand me.”

That vulnerability, whether real or counterfeit, leaves Kira unsure what to say in response.

The other Nerys rises to her feet. She stalks, hips swaying, over to Kira, and runs her palm down the side of Kira’s face. “You know what I think, Nerys? I think you’re as curious as I am about what the two of us together would be like. But I think you’re scared, scared enough to stop yourself from doing something you really want to do. Stop thinking so much and act.”

That’s it. Kira grabs her double’s wrist and yanks it away from her face. She pushes the Intendant backwards until her knees hit the bed, and the two of them topple over, Kira straddling the other Nerys, pinning her double’s wrists above her head. They stare at each other for a long moment, and then Kira bends down, and their lips meet in a kiss that is all clash, no sweetness, hungry and angry and desperate and _right._

The other Nerys rolls Kira over, and Kira does not stop her, but she moves her hands from the Intendant’s wrists to her shoulders, nails digging into flesh. Kira has bitten her double’s lip, and it looks slightly swollen, even redder than her lipstick. Beautiful.

The Intendant begins kissing down the length of Kira’s body, stopping first to bite none-too-gently at her nipples, then to lick at them with her teeth.

When she comes to Kira’s panties, she hooks her fingers through the sides and yanks them down. Kira bucks up against the body of her double, the other’s face maddeningly close to Kira’s throbbing cunt. But the Intendant moves back up Kira’s body, bringing their mouths together for another kiss.

The other Nerys plays with Kira’s ears, with her neck, with her breasts. She licks strips of tantalizing wetness along Kira’s inner thighs, and then blows on them, a welcome cool in the hot air of the room. She digs fingers into the curve of Kira’s ass, nips against her skin where her pelvic bones jut out at her hips. Twists away from all of Kira’s attempts to guide her where she really wants her to go.

Kira wants to scream. “If you’re going to do this, you need to stop teasing me and get to it.”

The other Nerys laughs. “Still in such a hurry! And here I thought I was pampering you. I don’t want this to be over too quickly, do you?”

Kira grabs her double’s wrist, stopping the Intendant’s feather-light movements around Kira’s left nipple. “Fuck me before I change my mind.”

“Oh, Nerys,” says the Intendant, smiling her unsettling smile. “You’re not going to change your mind.”

But she finally complies: two fingers push into Kira’s cunt in one firm movement, thrust in to the hilt. The Intendant brings her mouth down to Kira’s clit, and begins to work mouth and fingers in tandem. Kira is breathless and writhing in seconds, her double’s hands and lips sure, steady, perfect.

Kira comes faster than she has ever come at the touch of another, comes the way she does when she works herself over in her room at night with practiced fingers.

But her double does not stop. She keeps thrusting, keeps licking, and Kira wants to tell her it’s no use, that she won’t be able to bring her to orgasm again so soon, but she cannot bear to pull her double’s hand away. And sure enough, her pleasure builds once again, popping behind her eyes like the blur of stars the moment a ship goes to warp, grand as the universe, cresting and breaking in wave after wave.

After that, Kira pushes her double away, wincing as her fingers are pulled from her over-sensitive cunt. Her double lays down beside her, and Kira curls up, feeling her double’s eyes on her but uncaring for a moment for whatever game the two of them are playing, letting herself float on the afterimage of her pleasure.

“Nerys, my pet,” says her double after a minute, “get on your back, will you?”

Kira bristles. “What did you just call me?”

The Intendant leans close to whisper in Kira’s ear. “There are worse things to be on Terok Nor, you know.”

Kira stiffens. “Is that a threat?”

The Intendant smiles in challenge. “If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were stalling. Afraid you’re not as good with your tongue as I am?”

The manipulation is so transparent that Kira hates the way it’s working on her. But it is. They know each other too well. She cannot walk away now, not yet. Not when she can still see the slick of her own arousal against her double’s lips.

She lays herself on her back. The mattress is so soft she feels as though she is sinking into it. She cannot imagine sleeping like that, no support, nothing firm underneath to hold her. She looks at the other Nerys, at her gleeful face, her smudged lipstick. Her breasts, perfectly matched to Kira’s own. She stares up at her, their eyes meeting. Through gritted teeth, she says, “Do your worst.”

“My _worst_? Oh, Nerys. What are you so afraid of?” The Intendant crawls up the length of Kira’s body. Hardened nipples brush against the smooth expanse of Kira’s stomach. It has been a while since Kira was with a woman, and she would like to think that’s the cause of the anxiety churning inside her: a simple concern over sloppy technique. But she knows it is something deeper, something much harder to articulate.

The other Nerys positions herself so she is kneeling above Kira’s face, legs on either side of Kira’s head, cunt hovering just above Kira’s parted lips. Kira is momentarily distracted by the smoothness of her double’s skin—does her double shave? This is something Kira has never done in her life—so it is a welcome shock when the other Nerys settles herself down on Kira’s face and Kira can begin. She grinds slowly against Kira’s face, and Kira obliges with slow, steady movements of her own: first by running the ridges of her nose up and down her double’s clit, and then by doing the same thing with her tongue.

The Intendant truly does seem to enjoy taking things slowly. She appears in no hurry to speed up just yet. And where Kira is quiet, the Intendant is loud. She moans with each brush of Kira’s tongue against her clit, little mewls like some small and helpless creature. Kira cannot imagine making that much noise. Kira wonders what it would be like, to be so used to squeezing the last drop of pleasure from every moment. She wonders if she would be like that, too, if her first fumbling forays into the world of sexual activity, both partnered and solo, had not been under threadbare blankets in mountain caves under constant threat of discovery.

Kira lays back and inhales her other self. She has always loved her own taste, always licked her fingers after getting herself off. But it is different, being surrounded by the taste and scent of herself this completely. She feels devoured by it, consumed. She lets herself imagine, just for now, that all that matters is to lie here and bring the other Nerys this satisfaction, and it is glorious.

The other Nerys must be getting closer now, because she puts more weight on Kira’s face, grinding down against her until breathing is a delicious struggle. Kira speeds up her movements, and grabs her double’s thighs with her hands to hold on. She digs her nails into the smooth flesh, and her double responds by moaning harder, an almost-scream, and yanking Kira’s head back slightly with a fistful of her hair.

They stay like that, locked still and tense against each other, Kira’s slick tongue traversing her double’s hard clit, for a miniature eternity. Then the other Nerys comes with a cry, a scream, guttural and utterly unselfconscious, holding Kira’s face in place as she rides her through the climax. Kira finds herself fascinated, watching the totality of it all: as though such a thing, pleasure, matters more than anything else.

Sated, at least temporarily, the Intendant moves off Kira’s face and lays down beside her. She throws an arm across Kira’s chest, tracing small circles with her fingers. Kira grits her teeth. The glow of her own orgasm has faded, and she feels once more consumed by moves and countermoves, plans and contingencies.

“You really do want to return to your world, don’t you?” The other Nerys pouts.

Kira considers, finds no compelling reason to lie. “I do.”

“But you’ve only just got here! Maybe you just need some more time to see things my way.”

“You could release Bashir from Ore Processing,” Kira tries. “As a gesture of good faith.” _As a way to lose your bargaining chip with me, get us one step closer to escape._

The Intendant laughs. “You’re still on about that? Your Terran will be fine. You said it yourself, some hard labour will be good for him.”

Guilt slithers in Kira’s belly at the sharp shard of truth that had been behind those words. “He’s probably learned his lesson by now.”

“I know,” says the other Nerys, running her hand gently through Kira’s hair. “You hate to think of anyone suffering, even Terrans. You’re like me that way. But _they’re_ the ones who occupied _us_! If we don’t show them a firm hand, they could do it again one day. And someone has to process that ore, anyway.”

“So this is your revenge?”

“This is my strategy. For a strong Bajor. Nerys, my dear, I know that the Federation on your side is all about peace and cooperation, but surely you agree that an empire built on _kindness_ is never really going to last. Look what happened to the Terrans in my world when they tried that!”

“So you strike before someone else can strike first.”

“Someone’s got to end up on top. Why not Bajor?” The Intendant raises herself up on one elbow and looks down at Kira, running her nails lightly down Kira's torso.

“Why not indeed.”

The Intendant laughs again. “I can see we really do have a lot to teach one another. Tell me, Nerys—on your side, it was the Cardassians who occupied Bajor, yes?”

“That’s right.”

“And are you telling me they don’t deserve some comeuppance? A taste of the very same lash they used on you? Wouldn’t that be satisfying, at least a little bit?” The Intendant's voice is all honeyed sensuality, belying the violence of her words.

“Yes. It would be.” Kira allows herself to picture, for one terribly satisfying moment, Dukat in chains, wasting away in a labour camp. “But it’s not about what they deserve. It’s about what Bajor needs to grow, to heal. And it’s about being better than the Cardassians. There’s another kind of satisfaction in that.”

“My Nerys, it sounds as though you’re trying to convince yourself.”

Kira does not want to have this conversation anymore. There is too much that is true and not enough that is right. She rises from the bed, head spinning, and picks up the lavender jumpsuit from the floor.

“You wanted me to try this on,” says Kira, not a question. She does not put her underwear back on. She does not break eye contact with the Intendant, who still lounges, smirking, on the bed. She steps into the fabric and pulls it up over her body, fastening it in the back with nerve-clumsy fingers.

The other Nerys claps her hands, their conversation ostensibly forgotten—at least for now. “Yes! I love it, don’t you?”

“It’s very nice,” says Kira reluctantly, looking down at herself. It fits her perfectly, of course, hugging and flowing in all the right places. Elegant, which is not a word she would use to describe either her or her double.

“I’ll need that back for now,” says the other Nerys. “So I can have another one made for me and we can match tonight. Won’t that be fun, my pet?”

Kira grits her teeth, her hand itching for a weapon. But she simply breathes, in-out, and then meets her double’s gaze once again as she changes back into her own clothes, mirroring the Intendant’s cool smile.

* * *

Back on DS9, Kira lies on her bed and stares at the whorls carved into her ceiling. The mattress is neither as soft as the other Kira’s nor as hard as all the nights she’s spent sleeping on slim blankets atop firm Bajoran earth. She touches herself without really thinking, seeking comfort more than arousal, cupping her breasts in her palms like fruits: sweet. Home.

Maybe it is the chill in the room, or the water-like sensation of her fingers, or maybe it is the memory of seeing her own face before her earlier that day, but Kira thinks of the morning, years ago now, when she was so startled and disturbed by her reflection that she dropped that precious water jug into the stream. Her body still remembers how that first glance felt, her recoil harsh as the kickback of a badly-calibrated phaser rifle.

Maybe, it wasn’t that she saw something different in her face, staring back at her out of the water. Maybe what scared her that day was just the opposite: that after almost a year of adrenaline and weapons training and sabotage missions, of killing and of seeing others die, the Kira Nerys staring back at her looked the same as she had before.


End file.
